Let’s say you live in Orient and you want to see a Broadway play. It’s a three-hour drive and parking miseries. The other day I was in New York already, Broadway nearby. Would have been easy. But I had Mattituck on my mind, 90 miles east. Reason: The North Fork Community Theatre. (more…)

Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “Carousel” will be playing at the North Fork Community Theatre beginning tonight through June 2. Performances are Thursday through Sunday.

All shows are at 8 p.m. except for Sunday matinees at 2:30 p.m. A free, pre-show reception will start at 7 p.m. tonight. The receptions will be sponsored by The Market, in Greenport (tonight), Village Cheese Shop (May 23), and a wine tasting by Scarola Vineyards on May 30.

Tickets are $20 and can be purchased at 631-298-NFCT or www.nfct.com. Student Tickets are available for $15 today and Friday. To order student tickets or for group tickets, call the NFCT General Info line at 631-298-4500 and leave a message.

KATHARINE SCHROEDER PHOTO | Jacob Boergesson and Becca Mincielli sing ‘Romeo and Juliet’ from the musical ‘Reefer Madness’ during last weekend’s variety show at the North Fork Community Theatre.

Song, dance and comedy filled the North Fork Community Theatre in Mattituck last weekend. The 22 acts for the annual variety show, which featured three performances, helped benefit the NFCT’s scholarship fund.

The North Fork Community Theatre in Mattituck held its 8th annual Variety Show Friday night to benefit the NFCT scholarship fund, which awards scholarships to local graduating seniors pursuing music and the arts.

The show features singing, dancing, storytelling and even a little comedy and magic. There will be an additional performance on Sunday at 2:00 p.m. Admission is $10.

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KATHARINE SCHROEDER PHOTO | The North Fork Community Theatre in Mattituck held its 8th annual Variety Show Friday night to benefit the NFCT scholarship fund.

North Fork Community Theatre presents a fall production of “Harvey,” Mary Chase’s 1945 Pulitzer Prize-winning comedy, in which Elwood P. Dowd and his friend Harvey, an imaginary six-foot rabbit, cause a hilarious chain of mishaps as Dowd’s family attempts to deal with his eccentricity.

The show runs Friday, Oct. 14, through Sunday, Oct. 30, with performances on Friday and Saturday evenings at 8 p.m. and Sundays at 2:30 p.m. There is also a Thursday evening performance on Oct. 27. Special receptions will be held one hour before curtain time on opening weekend, Oct. 14-16, to celebrate NFCT’s Building on Tradition campaign to purchase its Mattituck home.

Tickets are $15. Call 298-6328 or visit nfct.com.

Meet some of the cast members:

Matthew Orr (Elwood P. Dowd)

Mr. Orr is no stranger to North Fork Community Theater productions, appearing most recently in “Arsenic and Old Lace” and “I Hate Hamlet.” He lives in Mattituck with his wife and three children.

Beverly Gregory (Veta Simmons)

A garden designer by trade, Ms. Gregory’s most recent appearance was in a production of “Waiting in the Wings” in New York City. She lives in Brooklyn and Greenport.

Wade Karlin (Dr. Lyman Sanderson)

Mr. Karlin has been with the North Fork Community Theater for over 25 years. His most recent appearances have been in productions of “The Foreigner” and “Crimes of the Heart.” He lives in Mattituck.

Lisa Dabrowski (Nurse Ruth Kelly)

Ms. Dabrowski’s performance in “Harvey” is her second appearance in a North Fork Community Theater production (she was in last year’s “Three Sisters”). She is a writer and artist and works for a local radio station. She lives in Cutchogue.

KATHARINE SCHROEDER PHOTO | James Stevens and Jessica Raven in a scene from Oklahoma!

The race is on for the North Fork Community Theatre to raise enough money for the 54-year-old theater group to buy and renovate the building where it performs.

Two years ago, the theater group entered into a contract with the neighboring Mattituck Presbyterian Church, which owns the building, to buy the property when the theater’s lease expires in August 2012. But the group needed to raise $750,000 to take possession of the building and do the required renovations. To date, NFCT has raised $250,000.

“That’s awesome, it’s just not awesome enough,” said Mary Motto Kalich, who is leading the building campaign. “The church has been wonderful enough to allow us to be there rent-free for 50 years. That’s a very, very long time. We really have existed on their generosity for so long. Now is the time to stand on our own.

“My biggest challenge is most people in the community seem to think we’re already saved. They don’t seem to understand we’ll be gone if we don’t raise enough money to purchase it,” she added.

Next Friday, June 17, NFCT will hold its third annual “Building on Tradition” gala at Vineyard Caterers in Aquebogue. This year called “Legends of the Theatre,” the event will honor 30 past presidents of the organization, many of whom have become legends among the theater’s all-volunteer participants. The event will also feature performances by members of the theater and there will be a DJ and dancing.

NFCT, the only year-round theater group in Southold or Riverhead towns with its own performance space, put on its first show, “The Man who Came to Dinner,” at Greenport High School in 1957 and moved into its current building on Old Sound Avenue in 1961.

Elaine Breese and her husband, Sydney, decided to start the theater along with another couple, Jim and Doris MacCammond, after a conversation in the Breeses’ Greenport living room one evening in 1957.

“They never would have believed there would be over 200 plays produced,” wrote Ms. Breese, whose late husband served as the organization’s first president.

“There is only one thing left to make their dream come true — to have a permanent home for the NFCT,” she added. “Let’s all join together and let that dream come true.”

“If anyone takes a look at the names, they know so many of them,” said Ms. Kalich. “All these people are so intertwined with the North Fork. The theater is such a part of the community.”

In preparation for the gala, Ms. Kalich has spent many hours on the telephone with past presidents and their families, who recounted memories to be included in a journal that will be given out at the event.

Tina Moffat Koslosky wrote on behalf of her late father, Jack Moffat, “I cannot remember a time when he and mom were not involved in the NFCT. It seemed like an extended family for me, something that was always in our lives,” she said. “Mom and Poppy learned to do it all in the theater. Each person had something to contribute.”

The theater produced one of her father’s original works, “Peanut Butter Prince,” when she was 3 years old.

“He wrapped so much into the story, parental conflict, the mother’s balancing act, the relaxed son, a servant who has yet to find his way, a junior witch who doesn’t fit in, the witch who is a be-spelled princess,” she said. “It was a complicated story of accomplishment and triumph. He was so proud of this work.”

Past president Art Wilks wrote of making lifelong friends and of the pleasure of transforming himself into a wide array of characters.

“The most important lesson I learned was to try and not get caught acting. Try to be the character, and react the way the character would react. I am still trying to learn how to do that,” he recalled.

Past president Pat Wall wrote about a lifetime of friendship, including meeting her husband, Bob, at the theater when he was helping build the set for “Man of La Mancha.”

“I did not come back as a participant until the recent production of Gypsy,” she said. “Although I had been gone for years it was as though I had never left. And that is part of the magic of community theater ­— you always feel at home.”

Tickets to the June 17 gala are $85 and tables for 10 can be reserved for $850. The organizers are also asking for donations of prizes for an auction during the event and are welcoming contributions from people who are unable to attend. For tickets, call 298-NFCT (6328). Donations can be made directly to NFCT, Box 86, Mattituck NY 11952. More information about upcoming shows is available at www.nfct.com. Anyone interested in helping with the ongoing campaign can call Ms. Kalich at 917-334-6639.